In Cold Blood (1967)

After a botched robbery results in the brutal murder of a rural family, two drifters elude police, in the end coming to terms with their own mortality and the repercussions of their vile atrocity.

Director:

Richard Brooks

Writers:

Truman Capote (based on the book by), Richard Brooks (written for the screen by)

Stars:

Robert Blake, Scott Wilson, John Forsythe

Nominated for 4 Oscars. Another 4 wins & 7 nominations.

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Robert Blake	...	Perry
Scott Wilson	...	Dick
John Forsythe	...	Alvin Dewey
Paul Stewart	...	Jensen
Gerald S. O'Loughlin	...	Harold Nye
Jeff Corey	...	Mr. Hickock
John Gallaudet	...	Roy Church
James Flavin	...	Clarence Duntz
Charles McGraw	...	Tex Smith
Will Geer	...	Prosecutor
John McLiam	...	Herbert Clutter
Ruth Storey	...	Bonnie Clutter
Brenda Currin	...	Nancy Clutter (as Brenda C. Currin)
Paul Hough	...	Kenyon Clutter
Vaughn Taylor	...	Good Samaritan

Storyline

In meeting in Kansas, ex-cons Perry Smith and Dick Hickock are breaking several conditions of their respective paroles. The meeting, initiated by Dick, is to plan and eventually carry out a robbery based on information he had received from a fellow inmate about $10,000 cash being locked in a hidden safe in the home of the farming Clutter family of Holcomb, Kansas. After the robbery, they plan on going to Mexico permanently to elude capture by the police. Each brings a necessary personality to the partnership to carry out the plan, Dick who is the brash manipulator, Perry the outwardly more sensitive but unrealistic dreamer with a violent streak under the surface. Perry literally carries all his dreams in a large box he takes with him wherever he goes. The robbery does not go according to plan in any respect, the pair who ultimately hogtie and execute all four members of the Clutter family, only coming away from the home with $43 in cash. As Perry and Dick go on the run, a murder ...

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Plot Keywords:

true crime | pair of killers | murder of family | gallows | based on true story | 

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Taglines:

The crime that shocked a nation.

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Genres:

Biography | Crime | Drama | History

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Certificate:

R

Did You Know?

Trivia

Over three decades after the release of this movie, one of its stars, Robert Blake (who played the murderer Perry Smith) himself became a real-life figure in a "true crime". In May 2001, Blake's second wife, Bonnie Lee Bakley, was murdered in the parking lot of an Italian restaurant at which the couple had eaten dinner. Blake was arrested and tried for murder and for solicitation of others to commit murder. After a multiyear trial that was heavily covered by the tabloids, in March 2005, Blake was found not guilty of either Bakley's murder or the counts of solicitation of murder. However, in November 2005, a civil suit found Blake liable for Bakley's death and ordered him to pay $30 million to Bakley's survivors. Although that award was later reduced on appeal, Blake filed for bankruptcy.

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Goofs

When Mr. Clutter is shaving, the calendar on the wall shows the month of March. The Clutters were murdered in November.

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Quotes

[first lines]
Little girl on bus: 'Scuse me.

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Connections

Featured in Reel Radicals: The Sixties Revolution in Film (2002)

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Soundtracks

Row, Row, Row Your Boat
(uncredited)
Traditional
Performed a cappella by Robert Blake and Ted Eccles

User Reviews

Extremely disturbing, even now

Although it was released way back in 1967, IN COLD BLOOD still remains the benchmark by which all true-crime films are matched. Veteran writer/director Richard Brooks (ELMER GANTRY) adapted Truman Capote's non-fiction book into a chilling docudrama that retains a disturbing power even today, thirty-five years later.

Robert Blake and Scott Wilson portray Perry Smith and Dick Hickock, two ex-cons who, on a tip from Hicock's old cellmate Floyd Wells, broke into the Holcomb, Kansas home of Herbert Clutter, looking for a wall safe supposedly containing $10,000. But no safe was ever found, and the two men instead wound up killing Mr. Clutter, his wife, and their two children, getting away with only a radio, a pair of binoculars, and a lousy forty dollars. Two months on the run, including an aimless "vacation" in northern Mexico, ended in Las Vegas when cops caught them in a stolen car. But it eventually comes out, after merciless grilling by Kansas law enforcement officials, that these two men committed that heinous crime in Holcomb. Tried and convicted on four counts of murder, they stew in jail over a five-year period of appeals and denials until both are hanged to death on April 14, 1965.

Blake and Smith are absolutely chilling as the two dispassionate killers who show no remorse for what they've done but are concerned about getting caught. John Forsythe also does a good turn as Alvin Dewey, the chief detective investigating the crime, as does Gerald S. O'Laughlin as his assistant. In a tactic that is both faithful to Capote's book and a good artistic gambit all around, Brooks does not show the murders at the beginning; instead, he shows the two killers pulling up to the Clutter house as the last light goes out, then cuts to the next morning and the horrifying discovery of the bodies. Only during the ride back to Kansas, when Blake is questioned by Forsythe and narrates the story, do we see the true horror of what happened that night. We don't see that much blood being spilled in these scenes, but we don't need to. The shotgun blasts and the horrified look on the Clutters' faces as they know they are about to die are more than disturbing enough, so there is no need to resort to explicitly bloody slasher-film violence.

Brooks wisely filmed IN COLD BLOOD in stark black-and-white, and the results are excellent thanks to Conrad Hall's expertise. The chilling jazz score by Quincy Jones is the capper. The end result is one of the most unsettling films of any kind ever made, devastating in its own low-key fashion. It is a 134-minute study of a crime that shook an entire state and indeed an entire nation, and should be seen, though viewer discretion is advised; the 'R' rating is there for a reason.

Details

Country:

USA

Language:

English French

Release Date:

15 December 1967 (USA)

Also Known As:

Truman Capote's In Cold Blood

Filming Locations:

Colorado Territorial Correctional Facility, Canon City, Colorado, USA

Box Office

Budget:

$3,500,000 (estimated)

Company Credits

Production Co:

Columbia Pictures, Pax Enterprises

Technical Specs

Runtime:

134 min

Sound Mix:

3 Channel Stereo (Westrex Recording System) (5.0) (L-R)

Color:

Black and White

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1